Advanced Player's Option!
As usual, this is a random thought experiment - I'm just wondering what sort of things could go into something  a reworked and expanded version of the Skills & Powers rules... Maybe the question should be 'what would 3E have looked like if they'd kept character points?'

Any thoughts welcome...Some of my thoughts are below, but probably none of this will make any sense at all unless you the reader are somewhat familiar with the late 2nd edition Skills & Powers book, one of the most terrible monstrosities to be unleashed upon the land during the late 2E era.
(EDIT: which can be found online at http://www.purpleworm.org/Library/Rules/ )
OK, so...

Subabilities
Stamina/Muscle: characters can potentially carry more than you can lift: convert the raw poundage values by Muscle score into a number of additional pounds lifted, which add to the base carrying capacity value from Stamina to determine a character's max. lift.

In original S&P you buy subabilities before you choose your class, but you're allowed to get to a 20 Muscle if you're going to be a warrior, which is a little bit weird.

Replace this with the ability to buy a +1 Muscle if you're a fighter (cost: 10, to be consistent with the dwarf racial ability), and add +10 the fighter's CP allowance. Perhaps just dump the 20 maximum and make this the cost to roll exceptional Strength (i.e. you get +1 Muscle, or can roll the d100 for 10 CPs, rather than going straight to 19).

Races
Remove 'ability to dual class' from humans as a core ability; make this an optional ability (cost: 10) and also give humans +10 CPs to their base Character Point allowance. This goes some way toward giving humans and non-humans balanced numbers of CPs...though more is required.

Integrate dwarf 'detection proficiencies' (using Wisdom/Intuition checks  rather than d6 rolls as in the PHB) from the Complete Dwarves' Handbook  into the dwarf racial package. Each ability is sold separately; triple  base x-on-d6 chance to determine S&P base proficiency rating, and  adjust base chance for Intuition. CPs from level advancement may be  spent to increase the base scores (1/1, like other NWPs).

It would also be possible to create some sort of 'Cave Explorer' class,  and just make this the favoured class for dwarves (see below), so that  they can buy abilities from that, rather than fighter.

Traits
'Traits' phase of chargen, where characters buy stuff like ambidexterity  or haemophilia or wild talent psionics, should occur before class  selection rather than later on, simultaneous with the proficiency phase.

Favoured Classes (new idea): it occurs to me that Character Points are a great way to add 'favoured class abilities' to characters. Characters could use racial CPs to buy class abilities from the race's favoured class list i.e.

 
          [FONT="]Race[/FONT] [FONT="]Favoured   Class[/FONT]
             [FONT="]Dwarf[/FONT] [FONT="]Fighter[/FONT]
             [FONT="]Elf    [/FONT][FONT="]Ranger*   [/FONT]
             [FONT="]Halfling    [/FONT][FONT="]Thief   [/FONT]
             [FONT="]Half-elf[/FONT] [FONT="]Any**[/FONT]
             [FONT="]Gnome [/FONT][FONT="]Wizard   [/FONT]
             [FONT="]Human   [/FONT][FONT="]class   chosen [/FONT]
       
*Assassin for dark elves
**Half-elves may choose abilities from one other class except their actual class(es).

  Class abilities
Changes to Class CP Costs: rather than giving characters CPs for delaying abilities to higher levels, characters should just spend their CPs on something else and then buy the abilities at higher levels. This applies to e.g. paladin spellcasting, but in general means a change to the rule that CPs gained at higher levels just be spent on proficiencies and the like.

Clerics need their base CP allowance roughly halved; most of the CP costs are due to the cost to purchase each Sphere individually, which should be reduced.

Integrate Thief abilities into the NWP system. Each thief ability is treated as an NWP, and is adjusted for Dex (usually) and increased with level using Character Points, rather than getting a number of percentage points when going up level.

I'd integrate the CP system for psionics, but revert it to be compatible with the Complete Psionics Handbook rules instead of the psionics rules in S&P.

Fighters need a major overhaul to give them a decent number of Character Points.
Convert 'Exceptional strength' and 'fighter hit point bonus of +3/+4'  into optional abilities for fighters (i.e. not free abilities that may just be useless) with costs of 10 points each, and add  +20 points to the fighter's CP allowance.

Kits
Kit special ability to buy recommended weapon proficiencies at -1 CP cost results in kit imbalance, since for warriors this drops cost of WPs from 2 to 1, i.e. doubles their number of weapon proficiencies known. [Drop rule]


Skill Challenges Using Ability Checks:
Skills & Powers has a weird system therein where doing something can require multiple checks to succeed, and high stats give you free bonus rolls. Also, multiple characters can pool their successes to do difficult tasks - e.g. the 17 Strength guy gets 3 checks to lift a door needing 2 successes, or two guys with only 1 check each could join forces to lift something. It looks almost like an early version of skill challenges...potentially you could steal some ideas from 4Es 'skill challenges' to expand on this in more detail and have an ability-check driven challenge system...

OK, subabilities:
Skills & Powers divides each ability into two 'subabilities' - these both start equal to the base (overall) ability, but you can move up to 2 points from one to the other - there can't be a difference of more than 4 points.

The original list of subabilities in S&P (and what they do) is:

Strength:
-Stamina (carry weight, bonus to movement rate)
-Muscle (hit, damage, open doors & bend bars/lift gates %)

Dexterity
-Aim (missile attack)
-Balance (reaction adjustment, defensive adjustment, base movement rate). Also called 'Agility' in some references - I think I prefer that, actually.

Constitution
-Health (system shock; if dwarf - saving throw bonus)
-Fitness (hit point adjustment, resurrection survival)

Intelligence
-Reason (max spell level, max. spell level, illusion immunity at 19+)
-Knowledge (bonus proficiencies, % to learn spell)

Wisdom
-Intuition (divine % spell failure, divine bonus spells)
-Willpower (magical defense adjustment; rolls vs. negative traits e.g. phobias)

Charisma
-Leadership ( # henchmen, loyalty base)
-Appearance (reaction adjustment)

Charisma
-Leadership
-Appearance

Proficiencies are based off the subabilities as well, but obviously some of these are a bit uneven in value. Potentially they need some uses moved around, or defined a bit better. The whole split could be redone, though I like most of these.

With Strength, all the combat stuff is currently under Muscle. Perhaps shift the 'to hit' bonus to Stamina, and keep 'damage' bonus off Muscle - but I'm not sure that makes sense.
The precedent for this is in a couple of places in AD&D - characters using artifacts with 1E could get great strength but clumsily, and so no hit bonus. Voadkyn (Wood Giants) in Bill Slaviksek's Complete Book of Humanoids have as a racial penalty that they don't get a to-hit bonus. I think most MM monsters with a damage bonus still didn't get a bonus to hit.(?) - something that could be represented as one but not both subabilities being especially high.

Stamina might also make work  for resisting 'bull rush' type attacks (Knockdown) - have to check combat & tactics...

Dexterity: Hmm, currently two weapon fighting penalties are based off Balance/Agility (since the penalty is offset by reaction adjustment)... Possibly reaction adj. should move to Aim.

Constitution: Health is currently mostly a 'dump stat' unless you're a dwarf, though system shock could be important. HP mod (Fitness) is currently used to calculate 'fatigue points' - perhaps move HPs to health and leave Fitness modifier there for fatigue.

Intelligence: unless you're a wizard, no point having a Reason score currently, apart from a few proficiencies. No idea how to fix this, as yet. (EDIT: I could actually divide the proficiency bonus across both stats, with half from each).

Wisdom: the split here is good since it divides up the 'willpower' and 'perception' aspects that don't really quite seem the same. Currently Intuition is useless to nonclerics, but potentially some sort of 'intuition check' would make sense as an extra use, to balance the stats - 2E always seemed to be missing a system for perception checks.

Charisma: I quite like the division here, actually. Its nice to know if the characters are good-looking, anyway, though I know not everyone considers Cha and Appearance to be related.

Hmm..another problem with the subabilities - conceptual overlap between 'Stamina' (Str) and 'Fitness' (Con), actually look sort of similar.
The definition of Stamina under Strength:

"The Stamina subability score determines muscle efficiency. A character with a Stamina score higher than his Muscle score may not have masses of huge muscles, but the muscles he has will be rock hard. Characten like these may surprise others-not because they can lift four hay bales at once, but because they can lift one or two at a time for 10 hours straight."

Fatigue points currently operate off Fitness, which brings the question of 'what does this Stamina thing do, anyway?'
Stamina could modify fatigue points instead, re-balancing the Muscle and Stamina stats. (though I then need to invent a new substat for Con).

A simple way to do fatigue might be to have fatigue cause loss of Strength points. If Stamina is higher than Muscle, it acts as a 'buffer' taking loss before Muscle is reduced, at 1:1. If Muscle is higher however, the fatigue gain is doubled.

Quote from: Bloody Stupid Johnson;466122Advanced Player's Option!
As usual, this is a random thought experiment - I'm just wondering what sort of things could go into something  a reworked and expanded version of the Skills & Powers rules... Maybe the question should be 'what would 3E have looked like if they'd kept character points?'

Any thoughts welcome...Some of my thoughts are below, but probably none of this will make any sense at all unless you the reader are somewhat familiar with the late 2nd edition Skills & Powers book, one of the most terrible monstrosities to be unleashed upon the land during the late 2E era.
(EDIT: which can be found online at http://www.purpleworm.org/Library/Rules/ )
OK, so...

Subabilities
Stamina/Muscle: characters can potentially carry more than you can lift: convert the raw poundage values by Muscle score into a number of additional pounds lifted, which add to the base carrying capacity value from Stamina to determine a character's max. lift.

In original S&P you buy subabilities before you choose your class, but you're allowed to get to a 20 Muscle if you're going to be a warrior, which is a little bit weird.

Replace this with the ability to buy a +1 Muscle if you're a fighter (cost: 10, to be consistent with the dwarf racial ability), and add +10 the fighter's CP allowance. Perhaps just dump the 20 maximum and make this the cost to roll exceptional Strength (i.e. you get +1 Muscle, or can roll the d100 for 10 CPs, rather than going straight to 19).

I hate to say it, but I was never too fond of the way subabilities were implemented in S&P. It felt too much like extra effort without much return.

Quote from: Bloody Stupid JohnsonRaces
Remove 'ability to dual class' from humans as a core ability; make this an optional ability (cost: 10) and also give humans +10 CPs to their base Character Point allowance. This goes some way toward giving humans and non-humans balanced numbers of CPs...though more is required.

Integrate dwarf 'detection proficiencies' (using Wisdom/Intuition checks  rather than d6 rolls as in the PHB) from the Complete Dwarves' Handbook  into the dwarf racial package. Each ability is sold separately; triple  base x-on-d6 chance to determine S&P base proficiency rating, and  adjust base chance for Intuition. CPs from level advancement may be  spent to increase the base scores (1/1, like other NWPs).

It would also be possible to create some sort of 'Cave Explorer' class,  and just make this the favoured class for dwarves (see below), so that  they can buy abilities from that, rather than fighter.

Traits
'Traits' phase of chargen, where characters buy stuff like ambidexterity  or haemophilia or wild talent psionics, should occur before class  selection rather than later on, simultaneous with the proficiency phase.

Favoured Classes (new idea): it occurs to me that Character Points are a great way to add 'favoured class abilities' to characters. Characters could use racial CPs to buy class abilities from the race's favoured class list i.e.

 
          [FONT="]Race[/FONT] [FONT="]Favoured   Class[/FONT]
             [FONT="]Dwarf[/FONT] [FONT="]Fighter[/FONT]
             [FONT="]Elf    [/FONT][FONT="]Ranger*   [/FONT]
             [FONT="]Halfling    [/FONT][FONT="]Thief   [/FONT]
             [FONT="]Half-elf[/FONT] [FONT="]Any**[/FONT]
             [FONT="]Gnome [/FONT][FONT="]Wizard   [/FONT]
             [FONT="]Human   [/FONT][FONT="]class   chosen [/FONT]
       
*Assassin for dark elves
**Half-elves may choose abilities from one other class except their actual class(es).

  Class abilities
Changes to Class CP Costs: rather than giving characters CPs for delaying abilities to higher levels, characters should just spend their CPs on something else and then buy the abilities at higher levels. This applies to e.g. paladin spellcasting, but in general means a change to the rule that CPs gained at higher levels just be spent on proficiencies and the like.

Clerics need their base CP allowance roughly halved; most of the CP costs are due to the cost to purchase each Sphere individually, which should be reduced.

Quote from: Bloody Stupid JohnsonIntegrate Thief abilities into the NWP system. Each thief ability is treated as an NWP, and is adjusted for Dex (usually) and increased with level using Character Points, rather than getting a number of percentage points when going up level.

They did something like this for the Ravenloft supplement, Masque of the Red Death. Thief skills were integrated into the non-weapon proficiency list. It felt way more elegant than the typical AD&D way of doing things, which is....roll d6 for one thing, roll d20 for a non-weapon proficiency check, make a percentile roll for Thief skills, etc. Honestly, I'd pick up that product just for the way it handles NWPs.

Quote from: Bloody Stupid JohnsonI'd integrate the CP system for psionics, but revert it to be compatible with the Complete Psionics Handbook rules instead of the psionics rules in S&P.

Possibly, but the psionics rules would need to be heavily rebalanced. Back in the day, when my group used to play tons and tons of Skills & Powers 2e, I used to figure out cheesy ways of getting 1st-level Psionicists to defeat 10th-level Fighters and 20th-level Paladins and whatnot. 2e psionics has the best flavor of any other edition of psionics, but needs some tweaks to make it manageable. I still like it though.

Quote from: Bloody Stupid JohnsonFighters need a major overhaul to give them a decent number of Character Points.
Convert 'Exceptional strength' and 'fighter hit point bonus of +3/+4'  into optional abilities for fighters (i.e. not free abilities that may just be useless) with costs of 10 points each, and add  +20 points to the fighter's CP allowance.

Kits
Kit special ability to buy recommended weapon proficiencies at -1 CP cost results in kit imbalance, since for warriors this drops cost of WPs from 2 to 1, i.e. doubles their number of weapon proficiencies known. [Drop rule]


Skill Challenges Using Ability Checks:
Skills & Powers has a weird system therein where doing something can require multiple checks to succeed, and high stats give you free bonus rolls. Also, multiple characters can pool their successes to do difficult tasks - e.g. the 17 Strength guy gets 3 checks to lift a door needing 2 successes, or two guys with only 1 check each could join forces to lift something. It looks almost like an early version of skill challenges...potentially you could steal some ideas from 4Es 'skill challenges' to expand on this in more detail and have an ability-check driven challenge system...

I wish I had more useful things to add. I like the addition of character points in the game, but the haphazard way it was done in S&P made things difficult for me as a DM. The product enabled incredibly colorful character concepts to be created though.

I kind of wish a streamlined Skills & Powers/3e hybrid had been designed, because it might have been interesting....:hmm:

Thanks for the input!

Quote from: Sacrificial Lamb;467359I hate to say it, but I was never too fond of the way subabilities were implemented in S&P. It felt too much like extra effort without much return.

Well, you're probably right. 12 stats is alot for me too...though I have heard some posters (Opaopajr I think) say they liked it...so I was mostly just taking the idea and running with it to see where it went.

I guess the subabilities are something its easy to ditch from S&P if you don't like them though... I had another idea to replace this, which would be to use NWPs instead - you could use your proficiency check score instead of a stat - so if you take a "Lifting skill" (1 slot, Str+2) you could use that score instead of Str to work out your encumberance, or "Ambidexterity" (1 slot, Dex+2) and use that as your Dex for working out two weapon fighting penalties..or something. Then you could have out extra slots for subability proficiencies. But, I think this would only work using NWPs like in the Player's Handbook, not if using the skill system in S&P where the values start quite low.

QuoteThey did something like this for the Ravenloft supplement, Masque of the Red Death. Thief skills were integrated into the non-weapon proficiency list. It felt way more elegant than the typical AD&D way of doing things, which is....roll d6 for one thing, roll d20 for a non-weapon proficiency check, make a percentile roll for Thief skills, etc. Honestly, I'd pick up that product just for the way it handles NWPs.

Seen it, actually. I don't mind the approach there, though it didn't give out any clues on how you could use the thief proficiencies with the Thief class...since Masque doesn't have thieves. The main problem is doing the improvements in thief skills, since NWPs are almost impossible to improve using Player's Handbook rules.
It wouldn't be very hard to make thief skills NWPs using the skills and powers proficiency system though, since that starts the base values low and lets the skills level up a lot.

QuotePossibly, but the psionics rules would need to be heavily rebalanced. Back in the day, when my group used to play tons and tons of Skills & Powers 2e, I used to figure out cheesy ways of getting 1st-level Psionicists to defeat 10th-level Fighters and 20th-level Paladins and whatnot. 2e psionics has the best flavor of any other edition of psionics, but needs some tweaks to make it manageable. I still like it though.

We never really had that many problems with the psionics handbook rules...but we played with fairly cruddy ability scores and the psionicists failed their power checks at least half the time. The only one that really comes to mind for me as broken is Dimension Door, which was great for making people fall to their deaths.

QuoteI wish I had more useful things to add. I like the addition of character points in the game, but the haphazard way it was done in S&P made things difficult for me as a DM. The product enabled incredibly colorful character concepts to be created though.

I kind of wish a streamlined Skills & Powers/3e hybrid had been designed, because it might have been interesting....:hmm:

Yep...it was unfortunate in that I think there were a number of good ideas in there, sometimes with some pretty bad implementation though...

Mostly I think the problem is that they were fighting to keep it compatible with standard 2E. Subabilities for instance let them sneak in extra stats without changing the 6-stat system, except that their rationale for doing it (each stat becomes 2) went overboard and made some useless substats.
Meanwhile, the character point allowances (and sometimes costs of abilities) for the different races and classes were often way off since they had to allow you to build the "standard" race and class packages which (as the number of CPs showed) were often sub-optimal. e.g. Half-elf vs. Elf really shows the half-elves who's boss.

I think areas of the game where they were actively trying to change game balance - like the proficiency system -  seemed to work better, since they weren't battling conflicting design goals by trying to change everything while leaving it all the same.

Well, have been looking over Combat & Tactics now as well.
Mostly this is shudder worthy, though I can see alot of the origins of 3Es combat system here.

The rules for 'phases' are weird - interesting since they do make it possible to do movement in bits, not just as 'teleport movement' where someone's whole movement occurs on their turn. The phase system is very abuseable for Small creatures, by the looks: the halflings and gnomes get to go a phase earlier for being Small, except that a movement rate of 6 or less - their standard movement rate - penalizes speed by a phase . A normal halfling or gnome therefore gets no benefit, but any bonus to speed (from Strength or Dex being exceptional), nets you a huge 1-phase speed advantage.

Looking over the way statistics worked, something else interesting: "movement rate" is a base number + reaction adjustment off Balance +to-hit adjustment from Stamina.
What's funny about this is that both scale quite differently: to-hit adjustment in 2E is +1 at 17 or 18, and up to +3 at 18/00 (and still only a +3 for a 20, using the higher limit for warriors in S&P), while reaction adjustment is +1 at 16, and goes up to +3 at an 18 --so Dex affects movement rate a fair bit more than Str does. Probably reasonable.

Wandering off on a tangent now...
Reading up on modifiers chart for movement led me into some other interesting thoughts on how modifiers in 2E affects things. 'Reaction adjustment' modifies surprise rolls (a d10 roll in 2E; and also modifies two weapon fighting penalty (attack rolls, therefore a d20 roll). Effectively, they've taken the same modifier here, and scaled down its effect by using a larger die.

This is pretty much the opposite of 3E, where you get the same modifier applying to every roll regardless of what it is: your Strength modifier adds to your roll to open doors (d20), and your longsword damage (d8); or where your Con modifier adds equally to your roll for hit points (which could be as low as d4) and your roll to resist poisons (d20).

Wondering now what would have happened if the universal system hadn't gone with just d20, and instead perhaps was roll-high with a variable die type system -with the dice in use depending on the task.
Having 'open doors' rolls use a smaller dice than d20 (d10+Str mod? d8+Str mod?) would fix the problem that Str checks for opening doors or arm-wrestling attempts in 3E are too random, and tend to be won by whoever rolls highest. Surprise in 2E would map fairly well to rolling [d10+Dex modifier], DC 4.

Postscript: I've stolen this last idea for my own fantasy heartbreaker, which is currently using [d10 +ability modifier] for ability checks and [d20+ability modifier +1/2 level + 3 if skilled] for skill checks.

Quote from: Bloody Stupid Johnson;466122Advanced Player's Option!
As usual, this is a random thought experiment - I'm just wondering what sort of things could go into something  a reworked and expanded version of the Skills & Powers rules... Maybe the question should be 'what would 3E have looked like if they'd kept character points?'

HackMaster 4th edition without the Legally required Parody Elements...


...seriously...

Thanks for that! May be something I should check out...